ORGANIZED VILLAGE OF KAKE v. DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE

No. 11-35517.

746 F.3d 970 (2014)

ORGANIZED VILLAGE OF KAKE; The Boat Company; Alaska Wilderness Recreation and Tourism Association; Southeast Alaska Conservation Council; Natural Resources Defense Council; Tongass Conservation Society; Greenpeace, Inc.; Wrangell Resource Council; Center for Biological Diversity; Defenders of Wildlife; Cascadia Wildlands; Sierra Club, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE; United States Forest Service; Tom Vilsack, in his Official Capacity as Secretary of Agriculture; Harris Sherman, in his Official Capacity as Under Secretary of Agriculture of Natural Resources and Environment; Tom Tidwell, in his official capacity as Chief, USDA Forest Service, Defendants, Alaska Forest Association, Inc., Intervenor-Defendant, and State of Alaska, Intervenor-Defendant-Appellant.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Filed March 26, 2014.


Attorney(s) appearing for the Case

Thomas E. Lenhart , Assistant Attorney General, Office of the Alaska Attorney General, Juneau, AK, for Intervenor-Defendant-Appellant.

Nathaniel S.W. Lawrence , Senior Attorney, Natural Resources Defense Council, Olympia, WA; Thomas S. Waldo , Earthjustice, Juneau, AK, for Plaintiffs-Appellees.

Katherine Wade Hazard , Attorney, United States Department of Justice, Environment & Natural Resources Division, Washington, D.C., for Defendants.

Julie A. Weis , Haglund Kelley Jones & Wilder, LLP, Portland, OR, for Intervenor-Defendant and Amicus Curiae.

Opinion by Judge Bea; Dissent by Judge McKeown.


OPINION

BEA, Circuit Judge:

When a federal agency decides to change its rules to allow roads to be built through a federal forest it had previously ruled be preserved roadless, what reasons are sufficient to justify that change?

The United States Department of Agriculture ("USDA") decided to change its rules to allow roads to be built through an Alaskan forest the USDA had previously ruled should be preserved roadless. We are called on to determine...

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